Audrey opened the bedroom door. Sam and Dean looked inside and froze in place for an instant, unable to even speak.
Sitting on the bed in the bedroom was a living brown Teddy bear that was more than two meters tall. Its curly hair was messy and stained with many wine stains. There were seven or eight empty wine bottles thrown on the floor next to it, as well as a pile of messily thumbed adult magazines. It was leaning on the bedside drunkenly, holding a TV remote control in its hand, sighing at the news channel on the TV, looking like a decadent middle-aged alcoholic.
Hearing the sound of the door opening, Teddy Bear turned his head sharply and roared angrily, his voice rough and dull:
"Close the fucking door!"
Audrey quickly reached out and closed the door, turned to look at Sam and Dean, with helpless and sad expressions on their faces.
"Did you see it? He wasn't like this before."
Sam and Dean stood at the door, looking at each other, unable to say a word, and their worldview was severely impacted. Bai Haorui leaned on the door frame, looking at the drunken Teddy bear on the bed, a trace of confusion flashed in his eyes.
The bedroom was filled with a faint smell of alcohol. Teddy Bear turned his head again and sneered at the political news on TV. He picked up the small wine bottle next to him and took a big sip. The wine dripped down his furry chin and onto the sheets. Audrey stood aside, looking at his Teddy Bear, with red eyes and a sad look on his face.
"I just wanted a big, live, talking Teddy bear." Audrey's voice was filled with tears, "But now he is unhappy all day long - not the kind of sadness that hurts his body after falling, but the kind of sadness that hurts in his heart. He always says some weird things, and his body smells like the smell on the bus."
"Uh, little girl..." Dean scratched his head, not knowing what to say for a while.
"My name is Audrey!" the little girl puffed up her cheeks.
"Okay, Audrey." Dean squatted down and looked at her level, "How did your Teddy bear become alive?"
Audrey sniffed and whispered, "I made a wish."
Sam was stunned for a moment, and looked at each other at Dean: "Did you come here with a wish?"
"Yes." Audrey nodded, "I made a wish at the Lucky Chin's Chinese Restaurant wishing fountain in town. I threw a coin in and made a wish for a live Teddy bear. The next morning, he was sitting on my bed."
Dean reached out and pushed open the bedroom door. The Teddy bear inside was sighing at the news screen on the TV, his tone full of despair.
"Look at this." It chuckled, full of self-mockery, "Do you believe this nonsense? Politicians talk nonsense, there are wars everywhere in the world, Famine everywhere, and bad things everywhere."
Dean twitched his lips. "I don't believe it."
"This world is rotten." Teddy Bear threw the remote control to the ground and let out a heartbreaking cry, "Why should I live?!"
Audrey quickly ran over and pulled its furry paw. "It's for a tea party! We're going to have a tea party together! We're going to water the flowers and watch cartoons together!"
"Tea party?" Teddy Xiong lowered his head and looked at her, his eyes full of despair, "Is this what I live for?"
Gunshots from the news suddenly came from the TV. Teddy Bear was so frightened that he shrank suddenly, and then showed a more desperate expression, holding his head and shrinking into a ball.
Sam quickly pulled Dean out, closed the bedroom door, and showed a gentle smile to Audrey, "Audrey, let us stay alone for a while, okay? We need to discuss Teddy's treatment plan."
After closing the door, the three of them leaned against the wall of the corridor, speaking in lowered voices, with expressions of disbelief on their faces. Bai Haorui leaned against the opposite wall, folding his arms and looking at them.
"Okay. Do we... shall... uh, do we kill this Teddy bear?" Sam's tone was a little hesitant.
"How to kill? Shoot to death? Or Haorui set fire to it?" Dean raised his eyebrows.
"I don't know, both of them? One of them must work."
"We don't even know if this trick will work." Dean immediately rejected it, "I don't want to provoke a giant Teddy bear that's on fire and going crazy. By then the whole town will be overthrown by us. How are we going to explain to the police? Burn the Teddy bear?"
"Yeah. And I always feel that this bear is not... you know, the core problem." Sam frowned, "The core is the wishing well."
Sam opened the bedroom door again, squatted down and looked at Audrey, with a gentle tone. "Audrey, where are your parents?"
"My mother made a wish for them to go to Bali for vacation, so I think they should be at Bali now." Audrey blinked his eyes and said it was natural.
Sam and Dean looked at each other, full of surprise.
"Well, um... I'm sorry to tell you this, but... your bear is sick. Yeah, he... he's got..."
Dean answered immediately and said seriously, "Lollipop disease."
Sam was stunned for a moment and immediately nodded in agreement. "Yes, lollipop disease."
"A bear of his size is particularly susceptible to this disease. Moreover, this disease is very contagious and can be passed on to children." Dean said it truthfully.
"Yes. So, is there... is there an adult you know whose house you can stay for a few days? We can isolate and treat him here."
Audrey thought for a while and nodded, "Mrs. Hurley lives across the street. She is very kind to me and often makes me biscuits."
"Great." Dean breathed a sigh of relief.
"Yes, okay, that's great. Well, we want you to stay at her house for a few days, okay? When Teddy's illness is cured, we will pick you up."
"Okay." Audrey nodded obediently.
Dean asked again, "Oh, by the way, Audrey? Where exactly is the wishing pool you mentioned?"
There were not many people in the restaurant at noon. A little boy ran to the wishing fountain in the center of the restaurant, threw a coin in, made a wish with his hands clasped together and his eyes closed, and then jumped out and ran out. Sam and Dean pushed open the door of the restaurant and walked in, walking straight to the wishing fountain. Bai Haorui followed behind, and Spiritual Sense instantly swept across the entire wishing fountain, and the golden fire between the eyebrows jumped slightly.
This is a round stone wishing pool. There is a plaster Buddha statue in the center of the pool. The pool is filled with clear water, and there are dense coins on the bottom of the water, which sparkle in the light.
"Do you think this thing is really effective?" Dean crossed his arms and looked at the wishing well.
"How about the living Teddy bear just now, do you have a better explanation?" Sam raised his eyebrows.
"Okay, there is only one way to verify." Dean touched his chin and took out a coin from his pocket.
"What wish do you want to make?" Sam immediately looked at him warily.
"Shh! It won't work if you say it." Dean made a silent gesture to him, closed his eyes and made a wish in the wishing well, then threw the coin in, and the coin sank to the bottom with a "ding-dong" sound.
As soon as he finished speaking, a guy wearing takeout clothes pushed open the door of the restaurant and walked in. He held up a half-meter-long hot dog in his hand and shouted loudly, "Who ordered the extra long jalapeno hot dog? Add double pickles and cheese!"
Dean immediately raised his hand with a proud look on his face, smiling like a successful child, "Mine! Here it is!"
A few minutes later, the three of them were sitting in a booth in the restaurant. Dean was taking big bites of the extra-long hot dog, eating it with gusto, and didn't notice the cheese on the corner of his mouth. Bai Haorui was sitting opposite, watching him devouring the food, and couldn't help but shake his head.
"Brother, this thing is absolutely magical. The wish I made just now is very specific. I even know whether to add chili peppers and how much pickles to add." Dean said vaguely and took another big bite.
"Teddy bears, hot dogs..." Sam tapped his fingers lightly on the table, frowning, sorting out clues.
"Hmm. I guess this one is too." Dean pointed to the newspaper spread out on the table, which was the headline about winning a lottery of 168 million yuan.
"I guess this one is too." Sam pointed to the couple at the next table who were still kissing passionately and almost inseparable. "This must definitely be included in the wish list."
"It definitely has to count." Dean nodded, and then frowned, "Then what should we do now, ah? Knock on the door from door to door to stop everyone from making wishes? This sounds too bastard, like robbing a child of a Christmas gift."
"Maybe. But please, brother." Sam looked at him with a serious tone, "When has this desire for something for nothing ever come without a price? And it's usually a life-threatening price. Have we seen too many of them?"
"It's hard to say, this hot dog is really delicious." Dean took another big bite and then waved his hand, "Okay, okay, let's find out what the origin of this wishing pool is first, and then we'll worry about these wish-making matters."
A black waitress wearing a Chinese top came over and looked at the take-out hot dog in Dean's hand. Her face immediately sank and her tone of voice was dissatisfied. "Uh, gentlemen, gentlemen, I'm sorry. We don't allow take-out food in our store."
Dean immediately put down the hot dog, straightened his face, took out a forged Health Bureau ID, and slapped it on the table. "From the Health Bureau, you, my friend, there is a rat infestation in this store. According to Section 56C of the Emergency Hazard Ordinance, we have to seal the place and completely eliminate it."
The waitress panicked instantly and her eyes widened. "Rat?! Our place is always very clean!"
Ten minutes later, the water in the wishing pool was completely drained, and all the coins on the bottom of the pool were exposed, and they were densely covered with a layer. Dean was wearing gloves, cleaning the coins in the pool, and putting them into bags one by one. Bai Haorui squatted by the pool, with a faint golden ray True Fire lingering on his fingertips, sweeping every inch of the bottom of the pool.
"It's just an ordinary fountain with a plaster Buddha statue added." Dean turned it over and found nothing unusual. "I didn't see anything wrong. There are no runes, no curse seals, nothing."
"Yeah, there's nothing." The waitress stood nearby with a nervous look on her face, "Our place is always very clean, there are absolutely no mice."
"Madam, during the preliminary investigation, could you please go out for a while? Thank you for your cooperation." Sam made a gesture of invitation to her, and the waiter turned around and left angrily.
Dean straightened up, picked up a coin from the pool, and threw it to Sam: "Hey, seriously, you are not tempted at all?" He threw another coin to Sam, "Don't you want to make a wish?"
Sam chuckled and threw the coin back into the pool, "No. Even if it comes true, it's not true. I can't believe this pie-in-the-sky thing."
Bai Haorui leaned on the edge of the pool and raised his eyebrows. "The wish I want to make will definitely not come true."
"It's hard to say, that bear just now was very real, and he drank and watched the news." Dean shrugged, "Please, if you could make a wish to go back to before everything started... think about it. Sam What would you do? Become a glamorous yuppie lawyer, drive a good car, live in a house with a white picket fence, and marry a beautiful wife; Haorui You will join a media company, or open a tavern according to your own ideas, hug everyone every day, and live a normal life."
"I won't make this wish." Sam's smile instantly faded.
"Neither will I." Bai Haorui's tone was very calm, but with unquestionable determination, "After discovering the truth of this world, I decided that I would not put my destiny in the hands of others."
"Really? You don't want to live a normal life?" Dean looked in disbelief.
"It's too late to go back to the old days, Dean." Sam looked at him, "We are no longer the Sam·Winchester and Bai Haorui we were before. We can't go back from this road."
"Okay, what do you want? Hmm? What wishes will our Sam and Bai Blockhead make?" Dean leaned against the pool and asked with a smile.
The smile on Sam's face disappeared in an instant, his tone was cold and serious, and his eyes were full of deep, irreducible hatred, and he said word by word:
"Lilith's head, bloody on a plate."
Bai Haorui also smiled, with a bit of self-deprecation and a bit of cruelty in his tone. "If it really comes true, I want that bastard who wrote the script to die."
Dean was stunned for a moment, then his eyes fell on the bottom of the pool, and he frowned. "Okay. Then what is this?"
Sam looked along his line of sight and saw a bronze coin embedded in the center of the bottom of the pool, under the base of the Buddha statue. It was completely different from other silver coins. It was engraved with strange lines and a coiled snake pattern, which glowed dimly under the light.
"Some kind of ancient coin, I have never seen the lines and symbols on it." Sam squatted down and looked at the coin carefully.
Dean jumped into the pool, reached down, and tried to pull the coin out from the bottom of the pool. He used all his strength and his face turned red. The coin didn't move at all, as if it was welded to the bottom of the pool.
"Holy shit." Dean cursed.
Sam couldn't help but laugh, "Use your legs to push harder, don't just use your waist, your old waist won't work anymore."
"Is this little thing welded on it? It doesn't move no matter how hard I pick it?" Dean didn't believe it, so he picked it hard a few times, but the coin still didn't move.
Bai Haorui squatted down and lightly brushed the ancient coin with the golden True Fire of his fingertips. The moment True Fire touched the coin, a layer of black anger instantly appeared on the surface of the coin, and it collided with Pure Yang True Fire, making a soft sizzling sound, like water poured on red-hot iron. He raised his eyes to look at the two people, and his face darkened.
"This thing is a black magic coin of Babylon, and what is engraved on it is Tiamat, the totem of the God of Chaos." His tone was very serious, "This is not an ordinary wishing well, it is a curse trap that spreads chaos."
"Babylon? You kid still understand this?" Dean looked surprised.
"There are similar things in Eastern evil arts." Bai Haorui took back his hand, and True Fire also took back the fingertips. "Use human sacrifices to activate the curse, realize people's wishes, and then twist the wishes into disasters little by little, and finally plunge the whole place into complete chaos and sacrifice it to the evil god. This thing is the same as that."
Ten minutes later, Sam and Dean returned to the restaurant with hammers and crowbars. When the Chinese waitress saw the tools in their hands, she became anxious and rushed over. "Hey, hey, hey, what are you going to do?! Are you going to smash my fountain!"
"Ma'am, I don't want to use Regulation 44/16 to punish you, but if you hinder us from performing our official duties, I will really do it." Sam put on a serious face and took out Federal Bureau of Investigation's ID. The waiter looked dissatisfied and turned around with a murmur, not forgetting to give Dean a hard look before leaving.
"Let me do it, I still don't believe it." Dean jumped into the dry wishing pool, inserted the crowbar into the gap between the coins and the bottom of the pool, then raised the hammer and hit the crowbar hard.
There was a loud "clang" sound. The crowbar did not break, but the wooden handle of the hammer was broken into two pieces. The hammer head flew far away and hit the opposite wall with a "clang" sound. However, the coin at the bottom of the pool remained motionless without even a scratch.
The Chinese waitress poked her head out from the door. When she saw this scene, she exclaimed, "Ouch!"
"Damn it!" Dean looked at the broken hammer in his hand and cursed.
"It seems that ordinary physical methods can't move it." Sam frowned.
"That's right." Dean threw the broken hammer aside, "I think it's the God of Chaos that Haorui said is protecting this well and this coin. We can't destroy it at all."
Sam squatted down, used rubbing paper to completely transfer the pattern on the coin, and handed it to Dean: "Okay, here you go. You go back to the motel, use John's notes and our database to check the origin of this pattern and the coin, and see if there is any way to solve it."
"Where are you going?" Dean took the rubbing paper and stuffed it into his pocket.
"I suddenly thought of something and I have to confirm it." Sam patted the gun in his pocket.
Bai Haorui straightened up and patted the dust on his pants. "I'll go with Sam. You should be careful when you go back to the hotel. Also, don't make random wishes secretly."
"I know, I'm sorry." Dean rolled his eyes and waved at them.
In the steamy bathroom, a blonde woman wearing only a bath towel was preparing to take a shower. Wet footprints appeared again on the tiles under her feet, and she was approaching her step by step. There was a very light breathing in the air.
Just when the invisible boy stretched out his hand to touch the woman's bath towel, Sam suddenly rushed out from behind the cubicle and grabbed the shoulder in the air. The next second, the naked boy suddenly appeared and froze on the spot, his face turning red instantly.
Bai Haorui leaned against the bathroom door with his hands in his pockets. Spiritual Sense had already firmly locked the entire bathroom. The entire space was shrouded in his perception, and the young man had no chance of hiding and escaping.
When the woman saw the naked boy who suddenly appeared, she let out a piercing scream, clutched her chest and ran away with her clothes.
"Don't worry, ma'am." Sam immediately showed a reassuring smile to the woman, "I'm from the Health Bureau, we are tracking down a peeping tom, and we have caught him now."
The blonde woman quickly picked up her clothes and ran out of the door.
Only Sam, Bai Haorui and the embarrassed boy were left in the bathroom, wanting to find a crack in the floor and crawl into it.
"So, you can control invisibility and appearance at will, right?" Sam crossed his arms and looked at him with a serious tone.
The young man's face turned red and he stuttered when he spoke, "You... how did you know that I..."
"Did you really go to the wishing fountain in the town, throw in a dime, and make a wish to become invisible, just to peek at the woman taking a bath in the bathroom?" Sam raised his eyebrows, his tone a little speechless.
"No--no. No, no, it's not." The young man waved his hands quickly, his eyes evasive, "This is too crazy."
Sam took a deep breath and looked helpless. "Put on your pants. From now on, you are no longer allowed to be invisible, do you hear me? If I find you doing something like this again, I will send you directly to the police station."
"Okay... Okay." The boy nodded quickly, grabbed the pants on the floor, and put them on in a hurry.
Bai Haorui leaned against the door and sneered, his tone full of sarcasm. "I'm really convinced. It seems that Japan has not watched too many action movies. He has become invisible. He just peeked? Promising."
In the motel room, the curtains were half-opened, the light was dim, and there was still a faint smell of disinfectant in the air. Sam opened the door and heard the sound of violent vomiting coming from the bathroom, as well as the sound of water being discharged from the faucet, one after another, which made everyone uncomfortable. Bai Haorui followed and immediately frowned.
"Dean? Are you okay?" Sam quickly walked to the bathroom door and knocked on the door.
The bathroom door opened, and Dean walked out with a pale face, his lips were bloodless, his forehead was covered with cold sweat, his steps were sloppy, he walked to the bed and sat down while holding on to the wall. His whole body was wilted, like an eggplant beaten by frost.
Bai Haorui immediately took out a bottle of mineral water and a drawn Safety Talisman from his bag, and handed it over. This talisman was drawn by him with Pure Yang True Fire.
"I told you, making random wishes will not end well." He said with a bit of helplessness in his tone, "Drink some water, burn the talisman in the water and drink it, it will relieve your pain."
"You have a crow's mouth." Dean weakly took the water, muttered, and then obediently did as he asked. He burned the talisman into ashes and mixed it with the water and drank it. It didn't take long for his frown to relax a little.
"It's the hot dog, right?" Sam handed him a new bottle of mineral water and sat next to him.
"All these wishes will go bad, Sam." Dean took a sip of water, calmed down, nodded, and said in a serious tone, "No matter what you wish for, it will turn out to be particularly bad in the end. I almost vomited out my intestines when I made a hot dog wish, and if others wish for something more outrageous, someone might die."
"What did you find?" Sam asked.
"That coin does belong to Babylon, and it is cursed." Dean picked up the notebook on the table, which was filled with the information he found. "I looked through John's notes and our ancient book database, and found some legendary fragments about this coin." As soon as he finished speaking, he covered his stomach again, showed a distressed expression, and waved his hands, "I'm fine. Well, the snake on the coin is Tiamat, which is the original god of chaos in the Babylon myth. I guess it is the priest of Babylon, who used this coin to cast powerful black magic."
"Did they make this coin?"
"Yes, it was made just to sow the seeds of chaos." Dean nodded, "Whoever throws this coin into the wishing well and makes the first wish will activate the magic of the well and the coin. Then it will begin to fulfill the wishes of everyone who comes to make a wish indiscriminately."
"But these wishes will be distorted, right?" Sam frowned, "You want a talking Teddy bear..."
"Just a crazy bear with bipolar disorder and suicidal thoughts." Bai Haorui leaned against the window and answered.
"And you made a wish for a hot dog, but you got E. coli and almost vomited out your intestines." Sam sighed, "This thing is just a bait."
"Well. Over the past hundreds of years, this thing has turned more than one small town upside down, and several towns have even disappeared from the map." Dean said in a serious tone, "I mean, it's troublesome enough for one person to make a wish, but if everyone in the town knows about this wishing well, they all come to make wishes..."
"It's completely messed up and out of control." Sam nodded.
"Hmm."
"Is there a way to stop it?"
"Yes, and there is only one way." Dean looked at him and said word by word, "We must find the first person to make a wish, that is, the first person to throw the coin into the well. Only he can take the coin out of the bottom of the pool. Only he can reverse all wishes that have been fulfilled. So now, we only know that a few crazy wishes have come true, but once everyone in the town knows about the existence of this wishing well, things will only get crazier and more outrageous, and in the end it will be impossible to stop it."
Audrey has gone to the neighbor's house across the street. The whole house is quiet, except for a small yellow desk lamp that is on in the bedroom on the second floor. The light is dim and the atmosphere is so depressing that one can't breathe.
On the whiteboard in the bedroom, a line of big words was written with a black Mark pen, "Life is meaningless.--Teddy Xiong Liu".